Leveling Guides v4.0

08Oct

We’ve got two months before Cataclysm is upon us, but we’ve only got a matter of days/weeks until 4.0 comes and changes up all of the talent trees as we know them.

So my question is, how early is too early to start posting leveling guides for the new talent trees? I know we still have patch notes coming out and all, so there’s no telling when something might change, but at the same time…do I dare wait?

Rather than being an informative post, this one’s going to be an opinion gathering post.

Dear readers, do you want me to start working on the leveling guides now, or do you consider even the class changes to be too much of a spoiler for me to show you before they go live?

Once the talent trees go live, I’d be ready and willing to read some more about leveling with the changes. While there might be variations in spells/talents before Cataclysm actually hits, I think the 4.0 changes will cause a significant enough change to justify getting started.

I could be dead wrong, but I think the majority of people will be fiddling with their mains to make them viable for leveling when Cataclysm arrives rather than starting new characters at 4.0’s drop, so waiting until it is actually live to begin with the others shouldn’t inconvenience people too much.

That had always been my assumption too, Windsoar. I was surprised to find out though how many people use a new expansion to roll their new main and do the whole process though. I was only peripherally aware of it during BC, but in Wrath I saw it a *lot* (and not just DK’s either).

This time for Cata I’ve actually poked around a bit, and given the new races, new class combos, and new content all the way, quite a large number of people seem to be intending to do 1-85 before they do 80-85.

Personally I still find that patently rediculous. :P I got all my Cata main candidates to 80 (well, Shaman is still 75, don’t judge :P ) in advance so I’d be ready asap to get into stuff. I have a few planned 1-85 chars too, but they’d be for well after at least one char was well established at 85 and geared more or less as well as he could be!

Still, point is, starting now would – imo – not be a bad thing. Especially since you may see a lot of people jumping the gun and getting started as soon as 4.0.3 drops, where the new race/class combos go live (excepting worgen/goblin of course, which won’t be out til Cata proper).

Hmmmmms…I was going to draft an outline of mine…and then plug in the info when the patch comes and they tweak things and finalize the changes. I will probably do Shaman first, then druid, then priest =)

My guides will mostly be in layman’s terms lol, half the guides out there already make me so confused…

I’d say start now, with the caveat of being prepared to revise over the next 2 months. I think it would be way too much to try to manage after Cata hits, at which point you’ll want to be playing not updating guides.
:)

Well I’m already working on my restoration druid healing guide for in cata itself (not 4.0) so I guess if you have the passion (and time) to adjust it as the patching flow then you can easily start writing them now

the main talents “should” be set in stone by now, so I don’t think there’s any reason not to start writing..

I would start now but make sure you keep the patch information prominently displayed, either in the title or a last updated for patch blurb. I found this was helpful for topics I knew would change, like gear posts – traffic shifted from “PvP Gear in 3.2″ to “PvP gear in 3.3.5,” for example – and it helps readers out a lot, too.

Also, there’s a real gap in leveling advice out there. Having some advice on how to go from 1-40 usually gets people where they need to be to push through the rest of the way – it’s those first 20 levels of awkward flailing, followed by another 20 levels of hopefully figuring things out, where you can make a difference.